IRVINE WELSH’S ECSTASY

Canada, 2011, 95 minutes, Colour.
Adam Sinclair, Kristin Kreuk, Billy Boyd, Carlo Rota, Keram Malicki- Sanchez, Stephen Mc Hattie.
Directed by Rob Heydon.

Irvine Welsh is famous for his books, especially about the world of drugs. Trainspotting became a cult film by Danny Boyle which was followed by Paul Mc Guigan’s The Acid House. A film version of Welsh’s novel Filth was set to follow Ecstasy. With Ecstasy, as the title immediately suggests, he is back in the drug world.

While this is a Canadian production, the exteriors were filmed in Edinburgh where the story is set. With so much of the filming done on the streets of the city, those who know the city will find it very familiar, giving the film an authentic feel. Interiors were filmed in Canada with some Canadian cast.

However, the central role is taken by Scot Adam Sinclair. He plays 28 year old Lloyd Buist, no job, man about town, especially at the clubs where he loves to dance, involved at times as a drug courier, with trips to Amsterdam, spending drug-high time with his close friends. No future, only the present.

For the first half hour, we are immersed in the club world, the music, the noise, the sex, the drugs. We begin to feel that if this is all the ecstasy world can offer, it would be better to leave. The appeal would be only to clubbers who wanted to see images of themselves on screen.

However, with some relief for us, a few human feelings are eventually introduced. Lloyd loves his old father (an interesting performance from Stephen Mc Hattie) who is still grieving his wife’s death, drinking and diagnosed with cancer. Lloyd is not without some redemptive values. However, even though he becomes attracted to a visiting Canadian woman (Kristin Kreuk) and is offered the possibility to change, he can’t do it. He is in debt to the deputy to the Edinburgh drug boss, a merciless brute with thug henchmen, who is not above bashing Lloyd’s girlfriend. Lloyd is forced to go on another trip to Amsterdam, buys some extra drugs to sell and pay off his debts. He swallows the bags – and they burst on the flight back home. He still gets through passport control as he is disguised as a priest.

The trouble for Lloyd is that he lacks vision, the possibilities for an alternate life. His girlfriend finally gives up on him.

One of Lloyd’s friends, Woodsy, is played by Billy Boyd as an obsessed ecstasy-taker, an ecstasy-devourer, an apostle for the drugs, who is taken off to hospital and rehabilitation. He clashes with a priest which gives him the chance to sound off against God and to declare that the drugs are the means of salvation.

While watching the clubbing can be wearying, the film moves to something of a moralising end, especially with the death and funeral of Lloyd’s father. Whether it would convert characters like Woodsy, it is difficult to say – though there is Woodsy sitting in the front row at the funeral. With Irvine Welsh’s name as part of the title, it is definitely an immersion in an Irvine Welsh world.


1. Irvine Welsh and his books? Film versions? His world? Scotland? The drug world?

2. The film immersing audiences in the drug world, identifying with the characters or not? The audiences and their age and different responses? Experiences?

3. The film as a cautionary tale, the target audience? The ending?

4. The Scottish drug world, the proliferation of drugs, recreational use, the addicts? The apostles of drugs, especially ecstasy? The hard world of the gangsters? Smuggling? The police and customs? Ecstasy itself, its effect?

5. Edinburgh, its landmarks, real and authentic? Ordinary life in Edinburgh? The streets? The contrast with the club world? The lights, the music, the beat? The smuggler’s world? Ordinary flats? Lloyd’s father and his home?

6. Lloyd’s story, his voice-over, age, experience, the death of his mother, the care for his father? Woodsy and Ally? Heather? The girls, clubbing, Lloyd and his being absorbed in the dancing? The flats, with his friends, more drug-taking? His huge debt? His living only in the present? Sometimes slow-witted? Drug euphoria? The trip to Amsterdam, the discussion with the dealer? His taking extra drugs, to make a profit? His passport control check, the examination of his luggage, his shrewdness with the inspector? The setting up of the dance in the church, the discussions with the priest? The music, the gangsters seeing what was happening, the information, the police raid? Lloyd’s aim in life?

7. Woodsy and his intensity, his back-talk to the priest, his attitude towards God, towards ecstasy, his behaviour, preaching ecstasy? His arrest, in the institution, the treatment? The various characters visiting him? His appearing at the end at the funeral? Ally, his restaurant, drugs? The girls and their involvement?

8. Lloyd’s dad, his story, hardworking all of his life, the death of his mother, hitting him hard, his sitting at home, the cigarettes, drinking, watching television? Talking with his son? His cancer? His giving his son money? His death, the funeral, the crowd, the eulogies?

9. Lloyd and the distribution, the church fiasco, the priest and his comment? The consequences? His debt going up?

10. The drug lords, the boss of Edinburgh? His intermediary, a hard man? Attitudes, force, threats?

11. Heather, with her friend at the club? Trying out ecstasy? Meeting Lloyd, the interest, falling in love, sharing with him? Going along with his lifestyle, yet criticising? Her job in the anti-drug campaign? Her finally giving up on Lloyd?

12. The boss, telling Lloyd to go to Holland again, his visit, buying more drugs, disguised as a priest? At the customs control? Swallowing the drugs – ill on the plane? Hospital? Surviving?

13. The boss and his bashing Heather?

14. Lloyd’s final decision, the confrontation, the deaths?

15. Lloyd and the possibility of change? His future, support from Heather? Hope? The moral encouragement to the audience?